Last Drop Not Good to Trojans

Welcome back, USC.

Back to the rest of the Pacific 10 Conference.

The No. 23 Trojans were the last team to be undefeated in conference, but that ended Thursday with a 68-67 loss to the Oregon Ducks before 8,590 at McArthur Court.

The loss ended USC’s seven-game winning streak and dropped the Trojans (12-6, 5-1) into a second-place tie with Oregon and Stanford. Arizona (6-1) moves back into first place.

Oregon, led by Alex Scales’ 18 points, improved to 14-3 overall with its third consecutive victory.

USC is now 0-6 when scoring fewer than 70 points. But 69 points would have been enough Thursday. And the Trojans had the ball and their chance with 8.6 seconds to play.

After Duck forward Darius Wright missed the front end of a one-and-one free-throw situation, USC rebounded the ball and zoomed down court. Brandon Granville drove toward the key, spotted Dave Bluthenthal under the basket and whipped a quick pass inside. But Bluthenthal never caught the ball and the Trojans couldn’t get a shot off as time expired.

“I only got a hand on the ball and never got control of it,” said Bluthenthal, who had 17 points and a game-high nine rebounds. “Someone hit the ball. I wasn’t sure who hit it; maybe A.D Smith. They just all collapsed on me.”

As he drove, Granville said, “I thought I saw four guys open. Dave was the closest to the basket. I was sure Dave got it and the game would be over, that we had pulled it out.

“That’s the way it goes.”

Coach Henry Bibby didn’t think it had to be that way.

“I thought we had played well. This is a tough place to play, but we had put ourselves in a position to win,” Bibby said. “And when you think you can win you have to get off a final shot. Not doing so is the most disappointing thing.”

USC could have also taken the lead earlier. Brian Scalabrine, who led the Trojans with 18 points, blocked a shot by Smith with 34 seconds to play. After a timeout, USC worked the ball to Scalabrine, who missed a turnaround 14-footer with 12 seconds left.

Earlier in the week Bibby had talked about the Ducks the way Lou Holtz did about Navy when he was at Notre Dame.

“I think Oregon has more weapons right now than Arizona or UCLA,” Bibby said. “This team is better than people think. They’re the [best] running team in the Pac-10 right now.”

And running was the one thing USC didn’t do. For most of the night, the Trojans were content to walk the ball up, use the clock and play a half-court game.

The first half had a near-tournament feel. There were four ties and four lead changes. But when Oregon took a 27-26 lead on a three-pointer by Wright with 7:26 remaining in the half, it did not give the lead back, finishing the first 20 minutes with a 40-36 edge. It was only the third time this season USC had trailed at halftime.

USC tried several half-court traps and a few matchup zones, but Oregon passed too quickly and too accurately for the defense to have that much impact. The Ducks stuck pretty much to an aggressive man-to-man defense and tried not to give the Trojans too many open looks.

The Ducks shot 54.8% (17 of 31) while the Trojans were 52% (13 of 25). But there were signs of trouble, the strongest one being USC did not score a field goal in the final 4:31 of the half. The Trojans’ last four points came on free throws by Jeff Trepagnier (who had two steals to give him a USC season-record 64) and Granville.

Nate Hair, who had a career-high 13 points off the bench, got USC even at 46 with a three-pointer with 15:56 to play in the second half. Hair would make another three-pointer at the 11:56 mark to put the Trojans ahead, 55-52. But the freshman guard didn’t score after that.

USC could have used the two free throws Hair missed with 2:21 to play. The Trojans also could have used the three free throws Trepagnier missed in the final 5 1/2 minutes of the game.

Most of all, they could have used a shot--any shot--in the final seconds.

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CONFERENCE STANDINGS

Team W-L

Arizona 6-1

Stanford 5-1

Oregon 5-1

USC 5-1

UCLA 3-3

Arizona St. 3-4

Oregon St. 2-4

California 2-4

Washington 1-6

Washington St. 0-7